Very few of my stories are written in the first person, so I hope you can understand why writing a biography is not the easy thing it would seem to be. Revealing pieces of myself in a fictionalized story is far different than showing in print the not-nearly-as-interesting me. However, I'm told a biography is obligatory on an author's website, so here goes nothing.

Yes, Val Brown is my name and not a pseudonym, though you might have read my stories as Cephalgia when they were online. I was born on a United States Air Force base in England a long time in the past, somewhere between 49 and 51 years ago. I could tell you the name of it, but it doesn't matter because it no longer exists. It is kind of weird to tell someone you were born in a place that doesn't exist anymore, a bit like Superman and Krypton. I was raised in a military household, the kind of home where you answered, "Sir?" when you were called. Like most military families, my brother and sister have always been my best friends, by the default of being the only ones who've known me since childhood, if nothing else.

I've lived all over the States, and in a few foreign countries, and I think that left a very deep impression on me. We lived in northern California when my dad retired from the Air Force and there we just sort of stayed. I went to Oakmont High School in Roseville, California and am a proud graduate of Sierra College in Rocklin, California. Can I get a shout out from all those wonderful community and junior college graduates?

After I graduated from college and passed my Nursing Boards, I settled into a nice rut, just what I thought I had missed as a kid. I did give it a try; I really did. The traveling thing gets in your blood, though, and after ten years at the same small community hospital, I burned out and ended up working the next 15 years as a traveling nurse. It turns out now that I have worked or lived in even more places as an adult than I had while growing up as a military brat.

I love being a tourist, and my interest in other countries, other customs, and other people is undiminished. I stopped traveling nursing over 4 years ago to take a steady position in the very same city where I graduated high school. I've even taught nursing in the same program I was part of. Now that's coming full circle.

In 2001 I was watching the horrific events of 9-11 on television. When I couldn't watch a moment more of that devastation, I turned to fiction on the Internet as an escape. I read a very moving story by an author named MJ Walker. I wrote a letter to her, praising her work. She wrote back and that began an abiding friendship and wonderful writing partnership. We wrote Connecting Hearts, Family Connections and Black's Magic together online, and then we were mind-bogglingly fortunate to find some very wonderful people to publish those works. Limitless-Dare to Dream eventually changed hands and is now Blue Feather Books, but my luck in being involved with wonderful people continues.

Caitlin and Emily at Blue Feather encouraged me to collect some of my shorter stories for an eclectic little book called Pearl Had to Die. The title is from one of my odder works, which is included in the book. I'm really proud of the things I've written. I have to confess I never saw this part of my life coming.

In 2009 I wrote my first solo novel, In The Works. You can find more details about it and all my writing in the section titled Great Works.

I have been extremely fortunate in my life. I have met so many wonderful people through my writing online and through the published works as well. My life has been enriched by them all. I live pretty quietly now, still working fulltime as a nurse. I write when I can and when the mood is on me. Recently, I was persuaded that having a website is a good thing.

So, I hope you'll get to know me, and let me get to know you. It's quite possible my little website won't see a lot of traffic, but however few of you there are, you are always very welcome here.